A very odd couple, with strings attached

December 11, 2009 — 11.00am

On the face of it, Richard Tognetti and Barry Humphries would seem to be unlikely bedfellows - although not as odd a pair as Sir Les Patterson and Dame Edna Everage, who are threatening to upstage the Australian Chamber Orchestra next week.

Soon after his arrival from San Francisco on Monday, Humphries had turned his mind to rehearsals and finding the pluck to front a program marrying the jazzy, rhapsodic and eccentric.

''I'm a patron of the ACO and I suppose that invites some obligation,'' says the actor and writer.

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''We made up a long list of little things, most of which have been cut."

The first half of the concert puts Humphries centre-stage as the master of ceremonies in what promises to be an illuminating and rare musical journey, followed after the interval by the brutal voices of Sir Les and Dame Edna as they make a spectacle of themselves.

''I have to trot out those marionettes,'' says Humphries, whose recent book Handling Edna: The Unauthorised Biography presents an elaborate conceit about the origins, triumphs, delusions and demons of the primitive woman from Moonee Ponds turned global gigastar. ''Dame Edna may have the book pulped. She is not happy about it.''

''Since my youth I've been interested in the influence of jazz in the '20s and '30s on European music,'' Humphries says. ''I corresponded with him late in his life when he was living in Brussels … The piece is short and jazzy, and so we'll be hearing that.''

In a not too dissimilar vein, the ensemble will venture Tognetti's arrangement of the second movement from Ravel's Violin Sonata No. 2 in G major, ''Blues: Moderato''.

''It's one of Ravel's least-known works. And then we will have a piece by Haas, who was murdered in Auschwitz and who, I think, wrote the String Quartet No. 2 (Opus 7, From the Monkey Mountains) when he was in the concentration camp.'' By this time in the program, the dapper raconteur expects to have warmed up for the occasion as he ventures excerpts from Walton's Facade, featuring texts by Edith Sitwell.

''I will be desperately trying to recite several of those tongue-twisters and delicate nonsense poems, including Long Steel Grass, Tango Pasodoble, Black Mrs Behemoth and Foxtrot. They are the ancestor of rap, except they have humour and sophistication.''

The ACO, led by Tognetti and featuring guest soloist Dejan Lazic on piano, will be augmented for the concerts; its 17 strings complemented by additional string players and wind, brass and percussion. In all, there will be 34 musicians on stage.

The tone and pace of the second half is sure to darken and find unexpected rhythms as befitting the presence of Sir Les, although the concert hall is not alien territory for a man said to bear a certain resemblance to the former prime minister Bob Hawke, and who was once backed by the 130-strong Australian Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Carl Davis in the 1980s.

''Sir Les will be coming on stage in off-white tie and tails,'' Humphries says. ''He will be singing a number of tunes, including Along the Road to Gundagai and his signature Chardonnay, a drop he is partial to even though it is no longer the fashion … His behaviour is very unpredictable but if he manages to stay off the liquor it will be nice to see him loitering in front of this orchestra …

''So far there has been no resistance to the idea of having Sir Les appear … but there is sure to be a whole body of resistance afterwards.''

When the friends and mutual admirers began toying with ideas for the collaboration, Sir Les and Dame Edna were given short shrift until Tognetti, an avowed supporter of larrikins and ratbags, managed to coax them out.

Humphries admits to not being a particularly good singer and recently had lessons from an opera singer in Britain. ''He told me [that] there was no reason why Dame Edna couldn't sing beautifully.'' The performer's eyes widen into an incredulous stare. ''I think that if I were to have another life I would wish to be a cocktail pianist.'' Next week's performances will feature Rachmaninov's Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, to showcase Lazic, but the concert's crowning moment has been reserved for Dame Edna in what Humphries, her support act and manager, calls her ''climactic aria'' - Why Do I Love Oz?

''It's a question we have all asked ourselves,'' says the satirist, who has forged an extraordinary career and who returns to Broadway in March.

Aside from working with the composer Carl Davis in London, Melbourne and Sydney in the early '80s, including a performance at the Royal Albert Hall - the ''marionettes'' were trotted out - Humphries' classical debut was in the 1970s, when he joined forces with the composer Nigel Butterley for First Day Covers.

''It was written for the ABC Sydney prom concerts and it featured Edna reading poems about possible postage stamps such as the Shark, the Blowfly and the Lamington,'' he recalls. ''I couldn't do the first performance because I was stuck in England, so Gordon Chater took over and did it as Norm [Edna's long deceased husband].''

Humphries grimaces as the memories come flooding back before he turns his attention to more pressing matters, such as rehearsing with the ACO and trying to overcome a creeping case of the jitters.

In a moment of whimsy, of which there are many during the interview, Humphries says he would love for Sandy Stone to make a fleeting appearance, if only to mimic his father's long ago words: ''Could we just have it a little quieter, please?''

Barry Humphries in Concert with the ACO is at the Opera House on Monday and Tuesday.